​The world is full of people who achieved high levels of ‘success’ in business, sport, wealth and other domains only to find this did not bring the happiness and satisfaction they sought.
 
Success in research is no different. My own experience on being awarded tenure, for example, was an immediate sense of relief after years of career insecurity, and of gratitude for the hard work of my team, followed by an unnerving feeling of ‘what now?’, when faced with the opposite extreme.

​However ironic this sounds, this is a remarkably common experience that needs its own solutions. The way I rationalise it today is that my craving for security and success had unconsciously taken over from the intrinsic motivations that brought me into research in the first place. So once I had all the security I could want, there was just emptiness.  Reconnecting with these underlying motivations, and the values they relate to, takes a while but that process is crucial.

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​Organisational psychologist Adam Grant writes: “Success is most rewarding when it serves the people and principles that matter to you”. Your values, in other words. Success when it comes feels hollow unless or until it is aligned with our deepest values.
 
But is a focus on values just a privilege of those lucky enough to have security? And what are values? How can we get crystal clear on ours, and, crucially, how can that help us in other career stages?

​Feelings of insecurity in research have many triggers: when the remaining funding period ticks below a year; an argument with the boss; being scooped on a paper; a fellowship rejection.
 
But feeling insecure can be even more damaging than job precarity itself. What does that chronic, pervasive, nagging doubt do to our research and to us? And how can we manage it better?
 
The answer to both questions is ‘much more than we think’!

​Science is a creative endeavour: without ideas there is no science. So why do our best ideas come in the shower? Or while out for a walk or staring into space? Long train journeys once had the same effect, before we had smartphones. What is it about these environments that allows our thoughts to flow freely and can we replicate this elsewhere?
 
My personal favourite is seminars where the speaker has completely lost me. Confined to my seat by the embarrassment of leaving, I feel desperate to occupy my mind. I’m drawn to random words from the talk, or any small fragment I can follow, before heading off at a tangent to wherever my thoughts take me. Perhaps I should be more grateful for these presentations!
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​What do all these circumstances have in common that allows ideas to flow? How does this process work? And how can we use this knowledge to optimise our working style and research culture?

If that title sounds scary, you really need to read this!

But how can you afford the time? After all, you’re overwhelmed!

​One of the biggest ironies about wellbeing and productivity in the workplace is the belief that we don’t have time for our own mental wellbeing. Under everyday pressure, we blunder along on three cylinders, hoping that working ever harder will solve our overwhelm problem.

​It won’t!

​All it will do is reduce our capacity by exhausting us. Our to-do list will remain infinite for all the reasons described before!
 
Working long hours at an intense rate for a short time can sometimes be useful. It can give us a productivity boost that gets us over the line with a major project. But it only works if we do this intentionally and build in deliberate rest time afterwards. If instead we do it in a state of panic, in the belief that our world will end if we slow down, we are heading for a crash sooner or later. 
 
Like all negative emotions, overwhelm is actually there to help us. It is a message that there is a problem, requesting us to take an appropriate action. So what problem is it, and what action do we need to take? This is where we usually go wrong. 

Why Series 2?
It’s fair to say the response to Series 1 of Science Without Anguish has greatly exceeded my expectations! I’m extremely pleased with the high number of reads, the level of engagement in social media, discussion in the webinar, and the many enthusiastic comments I’ve received. People I’ve never met before approach me at conferences and start a conversation with “I really like your blog”. I really never expected this to become an ice breaker! And I’m hugely grateful for this feedback.
 
Writing it has also clarified my own thoughts even more than I expected. The thoughts I wrote about were already there, swirling around in my mind with the everyday noise, but I always find writing a great way to clarify them. And it’s given me more courage to speak openly with other scientists about topics that normally feel off limits, like how many of us feel overwhelmed, the many roles of luck in research life and how we define ‘success’. I hope it’s had the same effects for you too.
 
But there is definitely more to say, and some topics to revisit. So what can you expect in Science Without Anguish Series 2?